The Awareness Center closed. We operated from April 30, 1999 - April 30, 2014. This site is being provided for educational & historical purposes.
We were the international Jewish Coalition Against Sexual Abuse/Assault (JCASA); and were dedicated to ending sexual violence in Jewish communities globally. We did our best to operate as the make a wish foundation for Jewish survivors of sex crimes. In the past we offered a clearinghouse of information, resources, support and advocacy.

Prior to murdering 8-year-old Nathan Scharf (Nussen Yaakov Scharf) on May 3, 1977, Lawrence Gordon had been arrested four times on charges of child molestation. Between 1972 to 1977, Gordon had been convicted on three of the four sexual offenses. Lawrence Gordon also went by the name of Lawrence Mc Quill. Under that name he had been arrested seven times since 1968. Besides the sexual assault charges, Gordon had also been arrested for arson, on charges of assault and possession of a weapon, some of these charges were still pending at the time of the boys murder. Nathan Scharf was the son of Rabbi Solomon Simpson of the Ocean View Jewish Center.

According to various reports Lawrence Gordon threw Nathan Scharf from the roof of a six-story apartment building in Brooklyn. The boy was found lying on the ground, just around the corner of his home. He was naked from the waste down. At the time of the murder Gordon worked as a security guard at the building in which Nathan was thrown.

Prior to the murder Judge William H. Booth stated he had two favorableconfidential psychiatric reports regarding Mr. Gordon's behavior, and had agreed to discharge him as long as he continued with his psychiatric treatment at a downstate medical center. One of the reports stated he had a job at the Manhattan Beach Jewish Center and was hoping to obtain a position at the Transit Authority.

On March 15, 1982, Lawrence Gordon was convicted of murder in the second
degree

New York --Following Hebrew ritual, 8-year-old Nathan Scharf, the son of a rabbi, was buried before sundown on the day following his death.

The boy had been hurled to his death from the roof of a six-story building near his Brookyn home, allegedly by a building security guard with a prior record of child molestation.

Lawrence Gordon, 32, was picked up for questioning at the scene of the crime Tuesday night and was booked for murder about nine hours later, police said.

Gordon worked at the complex only on weekends, but was a familiar figure with area children, whom he often tried to impress by flashing his guard's badge and handcuffs, according to a police spokesman.

The suspect had been arrested four times in the last five years, for a misdermeanor, bigamy, child molestation and an assault and weapons charge.

He plead guilty to the first three charges. There was no record of the disposition of the fourth charge. Gordon was given a conditional release on all his convictions, a status similar to parole.

Young Scharf, son of Rabbi Isak Scharf and a third grade student at United Lubavitcher Yeshiva, was buried Wednesday afternoon.

His scratched and battered body, nude from the waist down, had been found about 8:30 p.m. Tuesday.

New York –– Police arrested a building security guard Wednesday and charged his with tossing a Brooklyn rabbi's 8-year-old son form the roof of a six-story building.

Authorities identified the suspect as Lawrence Gordon, 32, of Brooklyn, who worked as a security gurard at an apartment building in the Sheepsheads Bay section of Brooklyn. The body of Nathan Scharf, aked from the waist down, was discovered Tuesday behind that building, only a block from his home.___________________________________________________________________________________

Security Guard With a Police Record Charged With Murder of a Boy, 8By Emanuel Perlmutter New York Times - May 5, 1977

A security guard whose police record includes sexual abuse of a child
was charged yesterday with hurling an 8-year- old boy to his death
Tuesday night from the roof of a six-story apartment building in
Brooklyn.

'77 Conviction in Murder Set Aside As Result of January Court Ruling; Appeal Being Considered

By Joseph P. Fried

New York Times - July 30, 1980

The murder conviction of a man who at first confessed to killing an
8-year-old boy by hurling him from a Brooklyn roof in 1977 was set aside
yesterday by a New York State Appeals Court and a new trial was
ordered.

Man Guilty in Slaying of ChildThe Associated Press - February 19, 1982 A Brooklyn jury yesterday visited a rooftop from which the 8-year-old son of a Hasidic rabbi was thrown to his death, then returned to the court and quickly found the defendant guilty of murder.The defendant, Lawrence Gordon, who was a security guard in the apartment complex where the boy was killed, could get up to 25 years to life in prison when he is sentenced March 15. It was the second murder trial for Mr. for Mr. Gordon. whose first conviction was reversed in 1980 on the grounds that a confession has been obtained improperly without his lawyer present.The victim, Nathan Scharf, was found dead, naked from the waist down, on May 3, 1977, in the rear of 2685 East Seventh Street in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn. The State Supreme Court jury of six men and six women went by bus to the scene yesterday morning, accompanied by the trial judge, Justice Richard Goldman; an assistant district attorney, Eric Bjornby, and the defense attorney, Richard Hannah.The judge said a recent court ruling had made such visits to the scene permissible if both the defense and prosecution agreed.Mr. Gordon, who was 32 at the time of the killing, had been convicted of crimes on three occasions. One of the convictions, in 1973, was for sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child. His other convictions were for bigamy in 1973 and for falsifying a report of an incident in which he was involved in 1973. He was giving conditional discharges –– tantamount to parole –– after each conviction.

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, RESPONDENT,v.LARRY GORDON, APPELLANT

Mangano, J. P., Brown, Niehoff and Lawrence, JJ., concur.

Appeal by
defendant from a judgment of the Supreme Court, Kings County (Goldman,
J.), rendered March 15, 1982, convicting him of murder in the second
degree, upon a jury verdict, and imposing sentence.

Judgment affirmed.

The evidence adduced at trial, while wholly circumstantial, was
sufficient to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that on May 3, 1977
defendant killed eight-year-old Nathan Scharf by throwing him off the
roof of a six-story building in Brooklyn (People v Benzinger, 36 N.Y.2d 29,
32). Witnesses put defendant in the company of the boy, who had a
bicycle with him, from shortly before 8 p.m. until they were last
observed together in the elevator heading up to the roof of the building
at about 8:15 p.m. About five minutes thereafter, a tenant heard a
shattering noise on the terrace. Investigation led to the discovery of
Nathan's broken body, naked from the waist down, on the terrace. His
bicycle was found in the stairway, next to the roof landing. Prior to
his arrest, during questioning by the police, defendant gave a false
alibi. After his arrest, defendant made damaging admissions outside
central booking to television news reporters who questioned him about
the crime.

Defendant stated to one of the reporters that he did not know
what he was doing at the time; that he was intoxicated and an
alcoholic; and that he was sorry about the whole thing. He also stated
that he only knew the boy from the neighborhood, did not know the boy's
family and did not know that his father was a rabbi.

We have viewed the videotape and find that it was properly admitted
into evidence. Uncounseled statements made after a defendant has
requested counsel are inadmissible only if elicited by an agent of the
State (People v Hobson, 39 N.Y.2d 479, 481). There is no evidence here
that the statements made by defendant during the television interview
were induced, provoked or encouraged by any actions of the police officers (see, People v Harris, 57 N.Y.2d 335,
342, cert denied 460 U.S. 1047; People v Jones, 47 N.Y.2d 528). On the
contrary, defendant freely decided to talk to reporters in an informal,
on-the-street meeting. Thus, the introduction of the videotape did not
violate his right to counsel (People v Hobson, supra, at p 481).

We have considered such other of defendant's arguments as have been preserved for our review and find them to be without merit.

Over the years the Scharf family has over come all sorts of adversities. Rabbi Yitzchok Scharf was born in Tarnopol, Poland in 1918. He had three
sisters and four brothers. The Soviets deported Yitzchok and his brother
Moshe to Siberia. They are the only members of their family who
survived the holocaust. After the World War II, Rabbi Scharf came to an Italian displaced
persons’ camp where he met and married Sheindel Trebitz from Subotica
Yugoslavia. On January 7, 1950 they immigrated to the United States. Rabbi Scharf, served as a congregational rabbi for 25
years. He passed away in 1979.

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Survivors ARE Heroes!

The Awareness Center believes ALL survivors of sex crimes should be given yellow ribbons to wear proudly.

Survivors of sexual violence (as adults and/or as a child) are just as deserving of a yellow ribbon as the men and women of our armed forces, who have been held captive as hostages or prisoners of war.

Survivors of sexual violence have been forced to learn how to survive, being held captive not by foreigners, but mostly by their own family members, teachers, camp counselors, coaches babysitters, rabbis, cantors or other trusted authority figures.

For these reasons ALL survivors of sexual violence should be seen as heroes!